


Bad Decisions Create Rescue Missions

by MandaWrites



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Kidge - Freeform, Kidgeweek 2017, could be interpreted as platonic, post season 2 kinda, un-beta'd and somewhat rushed, very slight Langst at the beginning, we're just assuming Shiro was found and re-joined the team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 15:13:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10573926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MandaWrites/pseuds/MandaWrites
Summary: After a competition goes horribly wrong, Pidge and Keith crash on a nearby planet. With their communication with the rest of the team cut off, they must survive until they are found and rescued.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for KidgeWeek 2017. Instead of writing something separate for each prompt, I did something different and used the prompts as a sort of outline and built a story around them and their order. The prompts are: jealousy, loss, change, crush, growth, storm, warmth. Some of the prompts are used more loosely than others, and some are more obvious than others, but they are all used in some way.

“Keith is always getting to do the cool stuff!”  
  
Hunk jumped, nearly dropping his spoon, as Lance stormed into the kitchen.  
  
“Keith is the one who found Blue. Keith is the one who gets to go to the Blade of Marmora’s headquarters with Shiro. Keith is the one who gets to lead Voltron. It was Keith who found and rescued Shiro _twice_. And now Shiro’s picked him for a solo spy mission. He says Keith is the most agile and the best fighter. Keith gets to do _everything_. And I-… I don’t get to do anything cool.”  
  
Lance sighed. Hunk laid his spoon down on the counter and placed a supportive hand on his long-time best friend’s shoulder.  
  
“You know, you’re part of a special team to defend the universe. You pilot a mechanical blue lion that’s part of a larger space robot. I mean, what’s cooler than that?”  
  
“I know, but-“  
  
Just then the door opened and in walked Keith. Lance’s eyes narrowed.  
  
“Well if it isn’t Mr. Solo-Mission himself.”  
  
“Are you still on about that?” Keith grunted.  
  
“Come on, we both know I’m the better candidate for that mission. You have no people skills whatsoever. How are you supposed to win people over?”  
  
Keith rolled his eyes. “It’s not about winning people over, it’s about gathering information.”  
  
“The only reason why Shiro chose you is because of his favoritism toward you.”  
  
Keith opened his mouth to argue back when Coran’s voice sounded through the intercom.  
  
“Attention everyone! We are approaching a large asteroid field. We will hide the castle near the center of it tonight and tomorrow we will make the wormhole jump to Grichi XR7.”  
  
Lance and Keith glared at each other.  
  
“Fine,” Keith said. “I know how we can settle this. We’ll use the pods to race to the other end of the asteroid field and back. Whoever makes it back to the castle first wins. If I win, then you have to stop complaining about any mission that Shiro gives me.”  
  
“And if I win, then you have to convince Shiro that I am the better person for the mission.”  
  
“Agreed.”  
  
“Guys, this is a bad idea. Shiro will kill you both if he finds out.” Hunk had all but forgotten about his cooking experiment in the midst of his teammates’ arguing.  
  
“Shiro doesn’t have to know,” Keith shot back.  
  
“Oh look at you, going behind your idol’s back.”  
  
“You’re one to talk, Lance.”  
  
“Let’s just get to the pods.”  
  
“I _really_ don’t think you guys should be doing this.” Hunk tried to get in front of them to block the door.  
  
“If you’re so worried, then just come with us. You can ride with me.” Lance determinedly pushed past Hunk and entered the hallway.  
  
“That’s not fair! It’d be too easy for him to help you cheat!” Keith scowled.  
  
“As if I’d need to cheat to beat you!”  
  
Keith shook his head and turned away just in time to see Pidge entering the hall from another room.  
  
“Pidge!” he called.  
  
“What are you doing?” Lance protested.  
  
“If Hunk is gonna ride with you, then Pidge is gonna ride with me.”  
  
“Wait, what am I getting dragged into?” Pidge asked.  
  
“You’re going to help me beat Lance in a race.”  
  
“Yeah, get all the help you need, mullet. You’re still going down.”  
  
Pidge shook her head. “You know, this sounds like a really bad idea.”  
  
“That’s what I sa-”  
  
“Let’s do it!”  
  
Hunk let out a long-suffering sigh as he followed his teammates to change into their armor.

* * *

  
“Alright, so we fly to the end of the asteroid field and back to the castle. Whoever makes it back first wins.” Lance reiterated the rules as he powered up his pod.  
  
“Shouldn’t take too long,” Keith challenged as he powered up his own pod.  
  
“I guess I’ll do the countdown,” Hunk sighed from next to Lance. “Are you both ready?”  
  
“Affirmative.”  
  
“Hell yeah.”  
  
“Alright. 3… 2… 1… Go!”  
  
The two pods flew out of their hangars and into the asteroid field. They expertly dodged the asteroids as Lance pulled ahead.  
  
“Are you doing ok over there, Keith?” Lance taunted as he dodged an asteroid. “You’re looking pretty far behind me already.”  
  
“I’m just giving you a head start.”  
  
“Oh, is _that_ what you’re calling it?”  
  
“Eat my dust, Lance!” Keith shouted into the comms as he sped up.  
  
They taunted each other as they flew through the asteroid field, putting quite some distance between them and the castle. After flying for nearly a half hour, they approached the edge of the asteroid field. It was less dense, but there were still several large asteroids.  
  
“Keith, watch out!” Pidge was barely able to get the words out before one of these asteroids collided with their pod.  
  
“What was that?” Keith yelled.  
  
“We lost an engine, dumbass!” Pidge yelled back, looking at the flashing text in front of her.  
  
“Shit.” Keith tried to steer the pod to avoid another asteroid, but with only one engine it veered to the right and crashed into a third asteroid.  
  
“Forget about your competition, we need to get back to the castle!”  
  
“I’m trying!” Keith fired up the engine, or at least tried to. It whirred briefly before spinning out, sending them flying in the wrong direction.  
  
“Hey, Keith? Where are you going? The race was only to the edge of the asteroid field.” Lance called into the comms.  
  
“We lost control of the pod. I can’t stop or change direction.”  
  
“Hunk and I are heading back to the castle. We’ll get help!”  
  
“Hurry!”  
  
Keith tried everything in his power to regain control of the pod, or at least slow it down, while Pidge climbed around to see if any of the damage could be repaired from inside the pod. Both actions were futile, and they both eventually gave up.  
  
“We really should’ve listened to Hunk,” Pidge lamented.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“So who was the idiot that came up with this idea?”  
  
Keith felt his face flush and he struggled to find a response. He couldn’t get any words out and just remained silent.  
  
“Not your best idea,” Pidge sighed.  
  
Keith looked away, feeling somewhat embarrassed. He could tell that Pidge was angry without her even having to say anything.  
  
“Anyway, I’m tired. Since we’re stuck here anyway I’m going to try and see if I can get some sleep. Wake me up if something happens.” Pidge curled up in her seat as best she could, facing away from Keith.

* * *

  
“Hunk! How do we tell Shiro that we lost Keith and Pidge?”  
  
“You mean how are _you_ going to tell Shiro that _you_ lost them. I told you from the beginning that this was a bad idea.”  
  
“Come on man, help me out on this! Shiro’s gonna kill me!”  
  
“I’ll mourn your loss,” Hunk replied flatly.  
  
“Hunk. Buddy. Please? I don’t know how to explain this to Shiro.”  
  
“Explain what to me?”  
  
Lance let out a high-pitched yelp before turning around to see Shiro standing behind him.  
  
“Nothing! Just that, uh… I was just thinking… how funny would Voltron look if it… didn’t… have… arms?”  
  
Shiro pinched the bridge of his nose. He could almost already feel a tension headache coming on.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
“Hunk? Wanna help me out?”  
  
Hunk sighed.  
  
“Lance and Keith were being idiots again. They decided to race in the asteroid field.”  
  
“And where is Keith now?”  
  
“I- we don’t know. He and Pidge lost an engine, and then we lost contact.”  
  
“Get to your lions.”

* * *

  
Keith awoke with a start. He blinked in confusion for a moment until he remembered why he was in a pod floating aimlessly in space. Outside of the front window he could see a planet that seemed to be pulling the pod in. He looked over at Pidge who was still awkwardly curled up in the seat next to him, sleeping lightly. He gently nudged her awake.  
  
“Keith? What’s going on?”  
  
“We’re going to be crash landing on a planet soon.”  
  
Pidge stretched and sat up in the seat. She tapped a few buttons on the screen in front of her to try and locate where they were heading.  
  
“It looks like the gravitational pull of this planet changed our trajectory and is pulling us in. We’re lucky that we happened to pass this planet at the right time. Otherwise, we’d still be floating aimlessly in space. Maybe once we crash, we’ll be able to find a way back to the castle.”  
  
Keith turned around and rummaged through the emergency supplies behind their seats.  
  
“Here,” he said, handing Pidge some of the emergency food. “We’ll need our strength when we land on the planet.”  
  
They ate together in silence, watching as the planet became closer and closer.

* * *

  
“Our scanners are detecting a fast-moving object with two life forms that appear to be human,” Allura said, voice laced with concern.  
  
“That has to be them. See if you can make contact,” Shiro replied.  
  
The blue, yellow, and black lions maneuvered their way through the dense asteroid field as quickly as they could. Unfortunately, the lions were much larger than the pods which slowed their progress substantially.  
  
“I think the pod’s comms are down, I can’t get through. And they’re out of range for me to contact the radio in their helmets.”  
  
“Alright. We’ll just have to catch up with them as quickly as we can. Once we get out of this asteroid field, we should be able to move faster. Everyone, stay focused.”

* * *

  
Pidge and Keith prepared for impact as they descended into the planet’s atmosphere. They landed with a hard thud, sending the two of them flying forward.  
  
“Are you ok?” Keith asked as he ripped off his seatbelt.  
  
“I think so,” Pidge replied hesitantly. She winced when she moved her right arm and quickly pulled it to her chest to cradle it.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Keith rushed to her side.  
  
“I-I think it’s broken.”  
  
“Let me see.”  
  
Pidge held out her arm. Keith gently took off her glove and rolled up her sleeve. Her wrist was discolored and starting to swell.  
  
“Shit,” Keith whispered under his breath. “Can you move your fingers at all?”  
  
Pidge attempted to wiggle her fingers and yelped at the pain it caused.  
  
“No.”  
  
Keith reached behind his seat for the first aid kit and rummaged through it. The only useful things he found was a roll of gauze and some pain medication. He bandaged Pidge’s wrist as best he could before giving her the pain medication. He then called into the comms on his helmet.  
  
“Lance? Hunk? Can anyone hear me? This is Keith. Answer if you can hear me.”  
  
Keith could hear nothing but static. He looked over at Pidge who just shook her head.  
  
“No one can hear us, so we may be stuck here a while. Let’s survey the damage, maybe we can fix it well enough to get off of this planet and call for help.”  
  
Pidge nodded. Keith climbed out of the pod before helping Pidge climb out. The ground was slippery with mud and the planet’s sun was just rising, but they managed to make their way around to the back of the pod.  
  
“This is bad,” Pidge said eyeing the damage. “One engine is completely gone and the other one is burned out. I don’t know if I can fix this, at least not without some spare parts.”  
  
Keith sighed. _Patience yields focus_ , he said to himself. “Alright, change of plans. Let’s get to higher ground. We can survey the area and decide what to do next.”  
  
The two of them slowly made their way back around the pod, slipping and sliding the whole time. Keith set off the pod’s built-in distress beacon before they started making their way up the hill. It was slow moving and they slipped down several times before giving up.  
  
“It’s no use. It’s too steep and muddy. It must’ve been raining for several days in a row. We’ll have to find another way to the top of the hill.”  
  
They started making their way through the mud around the base of the hill. They made it pretty far before they could hear the sound of rumbling behind them. Turning around, they saw the side of the hill collapsing, crushing the pod. Keith grabbed Pidge’s good hand and ran. Fortunately for them, they were just barely out of the path of the landslide.  
  
“I-… There’s no way I can fix that now.”  
  
Keith knew that her comment wasn’t intended to be humorous, but for some reason he couldn’t help but to laugh. Pidge looked at him in confusion for a moment before she started to laugh too. It was an absurd comment spawned from a dangerous yet entirely avoidable situation. And it was just another of many tense situations - their entire lives for the last few years had been nothing if not tense.  
  
Some of that tension dissipated as they laughed harder. It had been a _very_ long time since either of them had laughed that hard and once they started it was difficult to stop. Keith leaned against a boulder while Pidge kneeled down on the muddy ground, bracing herself with her good arm. Eventually, their laughing died down until they were both panting for breath.  
  
“We… We still… We still need to get… to the top of the hill,” Pidge said in between breaths.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
They made their way around, slowly working their way to higher elevation. Once they managed to make it to the top of the hill, they surveyed the area. There were in the foothills of a mountain range - they could faintly see the mountains towering in the distance. Most of the land directly around them seemed to be lifeless and covered in mud.  
  
“There’s some vegetation in that direction,” Keith said pointing to what appeared to be a small forest at the bottom of a nearby mountain. “Where there’s growth, there’s water. And probably food too.”  
  
“Let’s go,” Pidge said as she trudged through the mud in the direction of the forest.  
  
The terrain was uneven and the mud slowed them down even more. It took them hours to reach the forest. When they arrived, the planet’s sun was high in the sky and the harsh rays were beating down on them.  
  
“How’s your wrist?” Keith asked as he noticed Pidge wincing in pain.  
  
“The painkillers are wearing off but… I’ll be fine. I’m more tired than anything else.” Pidge could barely hold back a yawn.  
  
“We need to find somewhere to make camp soon. Everything else may have to wait until tomorrow.”  
  
“Is it night already?” Pidge asked dazedly. “I thought the sun was shining a moment ago?”  
  
Keith looked around in confusion, noticing how quickly it got dark. As if to answer the question on their minds, a loud clap of thunder echoed through the forest.  
  
“We need to find shelter quickly!”  
  
They made their way into the forest and worked their way towards the base of the mountain in hopes of finding a cave of some sort. The thunder sounded a few more times before the rain came down hard.

* * *

  
“I’m picking up a distress signal coming from this planet. It’s probably the pod. Stay alert, everyone!”  
  
Shiro lead the other two paladins to the surface of the planet. They landed at the base of a hill, not far from where Pidge and Keith had crashed.  
  
“This doesn’t make sense. This is where the signal is coming from, but there’s nothing here,” Hunk stated as they climbed out of their lions to get a closer look.  
  
Shiro observed the area. “It looks like there was a landslide here. And… the signal is coming from underground.”  
  
“This is bad!” Lance exclaimed.  
  
“Get back in your lions and start digging,” Shiro ordered. “Keith? Pidge? Can either of you hear me?”  
  
No answer.  
  
It didn’t take them long to uncover the pod. The inside was filled with mud and there was no sign of either Pidge or Keith anywhere.  
  
“That’s definitely one of our pods, but where did they go?” Lance questioned.  
  
“Let’s get to higher ground. We can survey the area and see if we can figure out where they may have gone.”

* * *

  
Their legs felt like lead as traveled deeper into the woods in hopes of finding some sort of shelter. The downpour had washed much of the mud off of their armor, leaving them soaking wet and shivering and coughing. They managed to find a small cave that was just deep enough to provide shelter from the cold wind and rain. It wasn’t much, but it was dry. They crawled into the cave and took off their bulky outer layer of armor, leaving them in just their black body suits. The armor was quickly piled at the back of the cave. They were both too cold, tired, and sore to think about anything other than sleep.  
  
Keith found a comfortable spot of dirt and laid down on his back with his hands behind his head. After a moment, he felt a sudden weight on his chest. He tensed up and his eyes shot open in surprise. He looked down to see Pidge curled up at his side, using his chest as a pillow. Her injured hand was carefully laid on his stomach.  
  
“Wha-“ he started to ask.  
  
“I’m cold. You’re warm,” Pidge mumbled, already half asleep.  
  
Keith paused. He still wasn’t used to the same level of physical contact that the rest of his teammates were. Usually he hated being touched, but laying in the cave, listening to the storm outside, the warmth radiating off of Pidge, it actually felt _nice_. He hesitantly wrapped one arm around Pidge and used the other one to brush some hair away from her face. Pidge instinctively adjusted herself and moved closer to Keith.  
  
A strange feeling welled in Keith’s chest at the sight of her sleeping so peacefully. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Exhaustion washed over him quickly and soon he was fast asleep.

* * *

  
“Oh my gosh, they are so cute!”  
  
“Lance, you do realize that they’ll _both_ kill you if they knew you said that, right?”  
  
“Then don’t tell them.”  
  
Hunk sighed and looked back toward Shiro who was just finishing up scanning the sleeping paladins with a tricorder.  
  
“How are they?”  
  
“They’re going to be just fine. Pidge has a broken wrist and they’re both dehydrated and exhausted, but it’s nothing that some time in the healing pods can’t fix.”  
  
Hunk and Lance both sighed in relief.  
  
“Alright, let’s get them back to the lions. Lance, you take Pidge and I’ll take Keith. Hunk, see if you can carry their armor. If you can’t take it all, we’ll just have to make two trips.”  
  
Lance knelt down and gently pulled Pidge away from Keith. Pidge didn’t even wake up and just seemed to curl up even more in Lance’s arms.  
  
Next, Shiro knelt down and picked up Keith. Keith stirred and opened his eyes halfway.  
  
“Shiro?” he asked, seemingly confused.  
  
“We’re taking you back to the castle. You’re going to be ok.”  
  
“Oh. Ok.” Keith’s eyes closed and he quickly fell back asleep.  
  
Together, the three paladins made their way through the forest, back to their lions.

* * *

  
Pidge slowly opened her eyes. She blinked a few times before hearing a hissing sound as the door of the healing pod opened. She stumbled and tripped right into someone’s chest.  
  
“Hey. Are you ok?” Keith asked as he steadied her.  
  
Pidge tentatively moved her wrist. When she realized she could do it without pain, she tried some larger movements. Her wrist seemed just fine, almost as if it had never been broken.  
  
“I’m fine.”  
  
“Good,” Keith said, letting go of her.  
  
Pidge looked around the infirmary. “How did we get back here?”  
  
“The others found us asleep in the cave and brought us back here. They followed after us and were behind us almost the whole time.”  
  
Pidge shivered and wrapped a nearby blanket around herself. “Let’s never use the pods for racing again. Things could’ve been so much worse.”  
  
Keith smiled. “Agreed. Besides, sleeping in the forest would be more fun if we had some camping supplies.”


End file.
